


Nobody Said It Was Easy

by rainy_fangirl



Series: songfics [10]
Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: Angst, F/M, I wrote this while I caught up on the manga, Memory Related, Relationship Study, Song Lyrics, Songfic, Unhealthy Relationships, set in between chapter 99 and 125 of re
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-04
Updated: 2018-07-04
Packaged: 2019-06-05 07:51:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,528
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15166040
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rainy_fangirl/pseuds/rainy_fangirl
Summary: "No one ever said it would be this hard."She had loved him in her monstrous way, she should’ve seen it coming, they existed on opposite planes.





	Nobody Said It Was Easy

_ {Come up to meet you, tell you I'm sorry _

_ You don't know how lovely you are} _

 

His eyes were burning holes in her, Touka is biting back the urge to duck under the coffee bar and stay there until he gets kidnapped again. She tries teasing him, attempting to bridge the gaps, long cracks two years have left her with. Touka toys with the rabbit keychain in her apron pocket, a habit she’s developed since he’s been gone. God, Kaneki’s been gone for so long, and even avoiding his eyes as the coffee brews, she’s missed him so much.

 

_ {I had to find you _

_ Tell you I need you _

_ Tell you I set you apart} _

 

Haise had always hated the white ends of his hair, leftovers of traumas from a life unknown. It’s all like this, he’s all like this, he thinks, splashing water onto his face like it would make the nightmare any less real. His Touka’s kept her distance, something he appreciated and doesn’t know how to reciprocate. He didn’t feel guilty the first time, or so he guessed from the memories that are still floating to the surface. He’d had a trend of it, feeling less guilty for leaving her because of who he’d left her with. There are vases of dead flowers, the little girl who used to water them obviously gone. His Tsukiyama is gone too, an ex-lover blown to the wind by recent events. He’d stopped by one, to say goodbye. He couldn’t remember then, but he does now. Shuu is gone now, the sentiment wasted and replaced by an already wilting bouquet of forget-me-nots. Unlike Tsuki, Touka is a constant presence. Like Hide, she’s more of a ghost haunting his doorstep than a real person. No, a real ghoul. The difference sends his head spinning, his days as Haise were better. The black and white of the world made it easier to bear.

 

_ {Tell me your secrets _

_ And ask me your questions _

_ Oh, let's go back to the start} _

 

She had plenty of skeletons in the closet, figuratively and literally. There was a time when Touka was content in her murderous, comfortable lifestyle. Her against the world had a youthful appeal, Touka can’t help but feel that she peaked at sixteen, before he’d ripped into her and made a home in between her heart and her stomach filled with butterflies. Before, before, before, she shouldn’t dwell on the past, but it’s where the hope was. He was gone and she was picking up the pieces. Kaneki Ken had ruined her several times before, and he would again. Touka wouldn’t stop him, she had no right to argue, no fight to put up. She just had to accept it, after all these years, it was still hard.

 

_ {Running in circles _

_ Coming up tails _

_ Heads on a science apart} _

 

She’d cried for days, her’s, her Kaneki, the only person she’d bothered holding onto since beginning to pretend human was a thing she could be. Taken, but worse, a dove. Touka had let herself love him in her last teenage years, despite the consequences, despite everyone else who already did, despite everything. She had loved him in her monstrous way, she should’ve seen it coming, they existed on opposite planes. He was human, dove material, even if he tried to pretend he wasn’t. She’d pushed, letting go of all he could’ve been was the only way to survive the twentieth ward, it still was. Haise wasn’t her’s, Touka had known that to begin with, but it had been nice for the ten minutes it took him to drink and debrief his team, for the ten minutes she’d gotten her hopes up and let them fall away like dead leaves. Haise still loved her coffee, and some self-indulgent part off her wanted to think that he still loved her, the whole, broken and glued back together, Touka. Looking back, she didn’t know if he’d ever thought more of her besides a body on a drunken night.

 

_ {Nobody said it was easy _

_ It's such a shame for us to part _

_ Nobody said it was easy _

_ No one ever said it would be this hard} _

 

He doesn’t know who they were before, he can’t figure it out now for the life of him. He didn’t even know his goddamn name, Haise was dead, so was Kaneki, which everyone else was calling him. He let her use it for lack of a better word; if he wasn't Kaneki now, who was he? 

Whoever he was now, he didn’t know her, at most she was a passing girl from a dream, too real to be his subconscious. In another world, another time...He can’t let go of Touka Kirishima.

 

_ {Oh, take me back to the start} _

 

Touka drowns in the ugly in between. She’s told him how she feels, felt before, but he doesn’t remember. Kaneki, her ruthless one-eyed King would’ve left her anyways. Kaneki, the once human, who’d break her heart again and again if he had to. Haise had been different, an homage to a normal life, a human boy and a human girl, one of their millions of what-ifs. She let it go, Touka had already, decidedly set Kaneki aside, packed him in a shoebox to gather dust in the closet. Haise arrived at the end of her mourning, and instead of opening an old wound, helped her close it. Knowing his position, seeing him smile set her free. Kaneki was dead, Touka could live on, except he wasn’t, the reality was messier.

 

_ {I was just guessing _

_ At numbers and figures _

_ Pulling the puzzles apart} _

 

Leaving her behind seemed second nature at this point. Despite the craters in his memory, Kaneki remembered that much. Touka glared at him from the corner of the room (a look he’d recognize everywhere, just ask Akira). He couldn’t bring himself to feel bad, she was a scrappy fighter at most, and had a store to defend to. As much as Kaneki hated to admit it, he could bear to see her more than necessary. It’s still sickening, it’s difficult to know her as anything other than an enemy, a cute (human) girl who owned and managed a coffee shop. Touka wasn’t innocent, that he knew. There were his ex-coworkers’ blood on her hands, she’d killed to survive and didn’t care who knew it. She wasn’t innocent, but neither was he, Touka was a constant reminder of it, Kaneki had hurt her and all he wanted to do was forget again.

 

_ {Questions of science _

_ Science and progress _

_ Do not speak as loud as my heart} _

 

At this point, Touka had come to expect it, waiting for him to come home, her nail beds still haven’t recovered from the past few months. As long as he comes home, she told Amon, they’d be okay. The reality of it was different, she could love him and wait all she wanted, her Kaneki was never coming home. He was dead, she’d grieved and come to accept it; it would always be her shop and her staff, that was all she needed. Maybe, Touka had planned, she’d open up to love (whatever that was) sometime or another, but not now, and certainly not to an ex-dove and ex first love. Then again, none of this was planned, and despite all he’d done to hurt her, she was happy to have him back.

 

_ {Tell me you love me _

_ Come back and haunt me _

_ Oh, and I rush to the start} _

 

Kaneki doesn’t want this to be the end, of either of them. It’s a feeling he’s unacquainted with, there hasn’t been much happiness in his life to begin with. It’s not love, what they’re feeling isn’t it, despite how new and fragile the death of Haise has made him feel. He can’t give her the peaceful, practically human life she’s used to, Kaneki can’t make her happy, despite how much they lie to each other and how much she might say otherwise. They’re a miserable pair who would meet a miserable end, in either death or separation, and it breaks his heart to know that. For all the blood he’s spilled and all the sleepless nights away from home without her, waiting and wanting, they’ll end eventually. But still, Kaneki can’t bring himself to give up hope.

 

_ {Running in circles _

_ Chasing our tails _

_ Coming back as we are} _

 

He said he’s home, for good this time, and Touka didn’t have the heart to tell him he’s lying, the hand on his chin is enough. Kaneki says he’s happy, he’s lying. After everything, she still isn’t enough, even through the layers of lies and things they’ve been through. They don’t feel right, they’ve never kissed, never even touched besides beat the shit out of each other during training and….the bite didn’t even leave a scar, even if Touka wished it did. She wants a memory of Kaneki needing her, even if it was only one time. They’re falling apart and she doesn’t know how to stop it, but when he comes back they’ll figure it out, she needs them to. 

 

_ {I'm going back to the start} _

 


End file.
